I get an email every weekday from Jack Freed with the latest entry to the Jack’s Winning Words blog. Many times they serve as the inspiration for what I post here. Jack finds little quotes from various sources and adds a short comment to each to provoke thought and reflection. I’m sure that he intends that each day’s post stand alone; however I found that two recent posts just seem to go together.

Today’s post was – “Shame on the body for breaking down while the spirit perseveres.” (John Dryden)

As Jack (and me, too) gets older he is more cognizant of the ravages and toll of age on the body, while the mind can still race around and jump as if it were still young. I certainly notice it more as I try to keep up the gardens around my historic home.

Last Friday’s post was – “Every wall has a door.” (Ralph Waldo Emerson)

Jack used that quote to offer life advice about overcoming difficulties in life. I’ve often written about that topic here.

It hit me, when I saw those two quotes in juxtaposition in my mail in-box that they really go together as a way to look at the end time of life. After all, death seems to be the final wall that we all face.

Certainly the human body does begin to break down and eventually gives up altogether; however, God has clearly given us a door in that wall, a way to overcome the death of the human body – eternal life through his Son Jesus Christ.

Just as believing that you can overcome obstacles in life is critical to success in problem solving; believing in the eternal life promised by Jesus is critical to opening the door to the wall that death seems to represent.

Like many other things in life, we all tend to overthink this topic. We focus in our minds too much on the scientific facts that we understand about death and not enough on the promise that our faith demands that we believe. There was another quote, this one from Bob Dylan that Jack used sometime ago that also fits here –

“You either believe or you don’t believe, there ain’t no in between.”

Death is just another wall in our lives and Jesus is the door in that wall. Thus, the title for today’s post – Believe and the door will open for you.

Jack Freed use this quote in his blog – Jack’s Winning Words – recently – “Smile, things are going to work out. You may not see it now, but you’re being directed to a much greater happiness.” (ThisInspiresUs). Jack went on to write – Jesus said, “Let not your heart be troubled or afraid…I am with you.” That’s the greater happiness.

In today’s find it now, buy it now, do it now world, having the patience, the perseverance and faith to wait for that greater happiness goes against the grain. We have become an instant gratification society, while religion has remained a “hope for it, pray for it, wait for it” practice.

Perhaps the biggest obstacle to having the faith that the promised “greater happiness” will come is dealing with the fact that this state of greater happiness will come after we have left this earth. For many people, the thought that they have to die to be born again into the state of greater happiness is not something that can easily accept or internalize. People want that state of greater happiness now, here, while they can enjoy it within the

current physical world that they know. They cannot even conceive of the next life, the one promised to those who believe in and accept Jesus as their savior.

Another factor is the kind of hazy descriptions that we have of that next life – a house of many rooms, one of which will be ours or a peace that passes all understanding or looking upon the face of God. We have a hard time relating to that within the context of what we understand about this life. Some other religions have created extensive and elaborate descriptions of the afterlife, mostly using terms and examples from this life, so that the adherents can relate to it. It is so much easier to imagine Heaven as being just like this world only better.

Perhaps a big part of our challenge as Christians is to let go of any thoughts about this life and this world and just trust that the next life and the greater happiness that is promised to us there. We need to stop worrying about whether we’ll be reunited with our lost loved
ones in heaven or whether our past pets will be there with us. That’s all the stuff of this world. We should focus instead on the fact that we will be united with Jesus and God and the Holy Spirit and all of the Saints in a greater happiness that we can’t even imagine – fee of pain, free of cares, free of fears, free.

So, maybe we need to substitute much more believing, in place of all of the effort we make to try to understand the unimaginable. We can’t and don’t need to understand, we just need to believe and accept. Once we let go of the things of this life, we are ready for the things that come in the next. It is sort of like those cute ads for the web site LetGo.com; we have to let go of the things we don’t really need any more for this life and certainly not for the next. If I can let go of the baggage of this life and just believe; I’ll be better prepared to experience the promised greater happiness – maybe I’ll even experience a little of it here. What a wonderful thought that is to focus upon today.

“I wouldn’t have seen it, if I hadn’t believed it.” – that little quote from today’s Jack’s Winning Words blog sounds a lot like something Yogi Berra might have said; however it was actually by Marshall McLuhan, a well known media guru and futurist. Marshall was talking about the Internet as we know it, which he foresaw by decades. He is also the coiner of the phrase – “The message is the medium.”

There are other things to which that quote might apply. Quite often people testify to witnessing miracles, which are usually based on believing that they can happen in the first place. Jack went on to discuss “aha” moments – those times in our lives when the light bulb comes on over our heads and we suddenly understand something or maybe have a great original thought or idea. Do you have those times in your life?

Sometimes the “aha” turns out to be an “oh, crap”, when you finally realize that you’ve been doing something wrong or just committed a faux paus. At those times, the light bulb that comes on is shedding light on something that we’d probably wish not to be in the spotlight. But, let’s stay on the positive side of things.

Many times an “aha” moment just pops out at us. It could be the name of someone or something that you just haven’t been able to recall or it could be the solution to a problem that you’ve been wrestling with for days. Sometimes; however, you just have to bear down and make that “aha” moment come, or as Gary Freidman said –

“Think until it hurts, until you can see what others can’t see so you can do what others can’t do.”

Marshall McLuhan saw things in our future that others couldn’t see and he thought about them, wrote about them and did something about them. Lest we forget, it is that second part of McLuhan’s quote that supports the first part- first he believed.

So, if you believe that you can overcome that obstacle in your life or make that breakthrough at work or achieve that relationship that you’ve always imagined; you have taken the first step to achieving your “aha” moment and making it come true. Maybe you will find it easier to believe that God will be there to help you achieve that “aha” breakthrough and that’s OK, too; at least you’ve placed your faith in the right place. Once you believe, start thinking and think until you can see a way to your goal when others can’t.